(tampa tribune) Prosecutors raised the stakes in the videotaped beating of a Lakeland girl with their decision Thursday to try eight teenage defendants as adults and with crimes that include kidnapping. The defendants, one as young as 14, now face a penalty of up to life in prison. The mother of one of the suspects said she can't understand the prosecutors' decision. "Look at their ages, they're not adults," said Christina Garcia, the mother of Mercades Nichols. "They still have a teenage mentality." All eight are scheduled for a first court appearance today in Bartow to face the kidnap charge and a charge of misdemeanor battery, said Chip Thullbery, spokesman for the state attorney's office in Polk County. Three of them also face felony charges of witness tampering. Tom Scarritt, a Tampa defense lawyer who is not connected with the case, said he wasn't surprised the defendants are being charged as adults but did consider it unusual that all eight face a kidnapping charge. "There's going to be some ringleaders and some followers," Scarritt said. "There will be different degrees of culpability." John Trevena, a defense lawyer from Pinellas County, called the decision "extraordinarily harsh and unfair to the defendants."

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